


Bad Day

by bjfic_archivist



Category: Queer as Folk (US)
Genre: Action/Adventure, Alternate Universe, Angst, Canon, Drama, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2005-05-28
Updated: 2005-05-28
Packaged: 2018-12-27 00:29:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,448
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12070056
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bjfic_archivist/pseuds/bjfic_archivist
Summary: It takes an unbelievably eventful day to bring Justin and Brian together and make them realize where they really belong





	Bad Day

**Author's Note:**

> Note from IrishCaelan, the archivist: this story was originally archived at [The Brian/Justin Fanfiction Archive](http://fanlore.org/wiki/Brian_Justin_Fanfiction_Archive). To preserve the archive, I began importing its works to the AO3 as an Open Doors-approved project in September 2017. I posted announcements, but may not have reached everyone. If you are (or know) this creator, please contact me using the e-mail address on [The Brian/Justin Fanfiction Archive collection profile](http://archiveofourown.org/collections/bjfic/profile).

8:54 a.m.  
Justin couldn't believe his bad luck. First, he had woken up too late to have breakfast on account of a power outage that reset his alarm. He struggled through his morning routine, showering and shaving, throwing on his uniform and charging out the door. None of it would have been so bad if he wasn't nauseated from hunger pains. Justin followed suit by not looking at the direction he was going and getting lost on the way to school. He had tripped, fallen in the mud, and skinned both his knees in a part of the city he doubted even the original bricklayers of Pittsburgh knew about. Soon afterward he'd been robbed at knife point of his backpack and wallet, neither of which had much inside. Justin walked along, half limping, until he found a street he thought he recognized, only to further himself into the underbelly of the city. An entourage of two pimps, four hustlers, nine drug pushers, and twelve homeless people attempted to have their way with him, grabbing at anything salvageable they could get their hands. His shirt was now torn down the front, his pants mud-stained, his shoes completely gone, and his dignity in shreds. He couldn't cry, but he certainly couldn't laugh.   
*I'm sure it isn't even noon.* Justin thought with dismay and decided that only a Monday could be this bad. He shook his head and reminded himself that it was Friday. 

Justin looked where his watch used to be and sighed. That was gone too. 

"At least I haven't been beaten senseless." He sighed, looking around instantly to make sure no one capable of making that a false statement had been within earshot. The street had cleared completely, shaking him further from his sanity. Where had they gone and why? Did they know something that he didn't? 

The sun disappeared behind some nearly black clouds as if a huge, cruel hand urged them on. 

"Oh, don't tell me!" He moaned, the last few words cut off by a severe thunderclap followed by monsoon style rain. Now, he told himself, was an appropriate time to cry. 

* 

10:03 a.m.  
"Shit!" Brian threw his blinking alarm clock off the bed-side table. The power must have gone off sometime between one and six in the morning, when he was still asleep. "If I'm late to this presentation I'm dead!" He looked around the room. No men in his bed. He silently swore at whoever it was that left without waking him up. Running to the shower at full speed, Brian realized all was futile as he slipped on a puddle of shaving cream his night guest had dropped. The bathroom was in shambles even before he crashed head-on into the wall mirror, shattering it. He groaned. His head spun with the aftermath of alcohol and amphetamine from the previous night as he lay flat on his naked back on the bathroom floor. 

Rain poured down, slapping violently into his windows. 

"Today is not my day." He told himself silently, grabbing a quick shower and brushing his teeth. Brian shaved at the mirror near his doorway, which had been left completely open, much like the refrigerator and cabinets. Knowing there was no time to even consider making a list of missing things, he ran to his closet and grabbed a suit, slipped into it, threw his briefcase by the door so he wouldn't forget it, and tied his shoes. He ran out the door within minutes of waking up, the rain still heavy. Brian ran to his Jeep and screamed in frustration. 

The windows were open. 

Brian got in and hoped someone at the office had a blow dryer. He pulled out of his space and was well on his way before noticing the different colors in his socks. Not only different shades, but different styles altogether. And his shoes weren't any better off. 

"What -is- this!?" He wondered aloud, pulling the Jeep into a U-turn and racing back to his building. Charging up the stairs, he glanced at his one shined shoe and the workout sneaker beside it. He didn't even want to know how he managed to pull it off. Brian grabbed another suit, the current one wet entirely by now, another pair of socks, and the match to his shined shoe. He tore out his door, blazing by the briefcase he'd twice forgotten, and not setting the alarm. He was finally on his way. 

* 

10:15 a.m.  
Justin shivered, sure by now he'd contracted some horrible disease just by passing the run-down tenement buildings he wandered helplessly by. He was famished and there were no pay phones in sight. The wish of never waking up that morning had come and gone more than once. His socks were a dirty brown on top, black on the bottom, and soggy through and through. 

"'ey, prettay!" A man shouted, slurring even the simplest of words. Justin swallowed hard and moved faster. 

"Hey, I jus wanded to talk to you." The man followed. 

"Leave me alone!" Justin ordered in his most ferocious voice. 

"Jus shtop a shecont." 

"No. Go home!" 

"Sho you wansta go up to ma plashe?" He swiped at Justin, who was at least a few yards away, then sat down on the curb, defeated. 

"Is this even Pittsburgh anymore?!" Justin shouted into the dark sky, wondering when the people had once again crawled out of the woodwork. 

"It's Georgia." A woman informed him while tending to her soda can garden. "We're in Georgia, not Kansas anymore." 

"Oh for the love of gay men." Justin mumbled and kept walking, sure that if he walked long enough he would end up either at school or in Saskatchewan. He pulled off his wet socks and heaved them across the street. 

"Hey!" Someone shouted. "Hey!" 

Justin looked around until he saw a rather large, rather armed black man racing toward him from one of the buildings. Justin couldn't help but shriek at the sight and plant himself to the sidewalk with fear. 

"You think you're better than us here, throwing your damn laundry all over the road!" He growled, heaving the bat, which was luckily made of hollow plastic, into Justin more times than he wanted to count. "Damn cracker." 

Justin wondered if perhaps he had just gotten the sense beaten out of him, or if he'd lost it a while ago which gave him a reason to throw his socks. He suddenly yearned for the terror of a pop quiz in calculus or a random beating from the jocks of St. James Academy. At least then he would know where he was. 

* 

10:45 a.m.  
Brian entered the room with as much gusto as he could possibly muster, shaking the hands of each client. He acted as if he was having the best day of his life, despite the ache in his tailbone from the fall or the small gash across his nose from the mirror. 

"Ladies and gentlemen, may I present to you the best advertising in town." He told them and froze. The presentation he spent a week preparing was not in the office. It was not in the building. It was not in his Jeep. It was in his briefcase at home. All eyes were on him. He forced a chuckle. 

"I am having a shitty day." He admitted and dismissed himself with a graceful bow. He hoped that perhaps they would appreciate his honesty, as that would be the only way he kept these clients. He squeezed his eyes shut and walked towards the front doors of the building, picking up speed so Ryder didn't happen to find him, and ended up running straight into the doorjamb. He grit his teeth but kept going, afraid of looking back and seeing the smirks. 

He drove to The Big Q-Mart and stalked Michael until his friend had to acknowledge him. 

"You look terrible!" Michael gasped. 

"You're not going to believe the bad luck I've had today. I swear, Mikey, someone's against me up there!" 

Michael hid a smile. "Well, maybe you should have called Him back." 

"Ha ha ha, Mikey." 

"Besides, even the most Godly of men have bad day's, Bri. Just think that whatever you're going through, someone else is having worse." 

"Now Mikey, you know I try not to think of others." 

"Why don't you go to Liberty and have my mom make you something warm to eat. She'll be sure to let you know who's worse off than you." 

"You're a big help, Mikey." Brian sighed. 

Michael smiled. "Sorry." 

* 

11:09 a.m.  
Brian couldn't think of any audible curses appropriate for this day. None were vulgar enough. None expressed the turmoil and inability to do anything to help the situation. He stared into the sky as the fire-hydrant geyser shot beyond his range of vision. There were just some things Brian couldn't understand, and one of them was how he managed to destroy his new Jeep already. He looked from its crunched nose to the fire hydrant trunk all the way across the street. 

"It's beyond me." He decided. "There has to be a reason for all of this." Brian looked for an umbrella in the back seat, though he knew it was a futile search. He was not one to be practical, after all. That was Michael's department, and he wasn't around. Brian watched a few spectators walk away as quickly as they had gathered, huddled together in strange groups. Brian decided that the warmer water hitting him had to be the hydrant water. He shook his head and got back into the Jeep. At least I made it out with relatively few bruises. He reached into his jacket pocket for his cell phone. Not finding it, he slammed his head into the steering column. 

"My other jacket." He realized, too late. No cell phone. No pay phones. He patted his left pant pocket for his wallet out of instinct. That too was missing, though he suspected the crowd of spectators for that and not his change of clothes. Brian got out and started walking. His building wasn't any more than three or four blocks from here, and if he wanted to make it home at all before the entire world collapsed around him, he had better start walking. 

* 

11:11 a.m.  
Justin opened his eyes, the world slowly becoming clear through a long, dark passageway. He wondered whether he had passed out from hunger or from the cold weather. Regretting not being dead, he slowly got to his feet. If there was one thing for sure, he didn't know what it was. He imagined Brian coming to rescue him in his brilliant black Jeep and mending his wounds. But Justin knew Brian didn't much want anything to do with playing wet nurse with him. After all, they had barely seen each other at Babylon the previous night. The older man had gone home with some Italian-looking stud, his hazel eyes just as hurtful as they could be, while Justin returned home alone to brood. He didn't know what was worse: being in this mess in the first place or having Brian never look at him again. He started to sob, sinking down onto the curb, his feet in the fast-moving, icy water. He sneezed once, twice, three times and then coughed with energy he didn't know he had. 

"Ohhh." He moaned nasally. 

* 

"There is absolutely no way someone else is having a worse day than I am." Brian told himself quietly. 

"Georgia." A woman said nearly as quietly to her own self. "We're in Georgia, not Kansas anymore." 

"I'll keep that in mind." Brian snickered. *At least -she's- happy.* He kept walking, legs aching. Too much running without the control of the treadmill. "Oh ho ho." 

Brian paused. He had to chuckle at the hunched-over form of what could only be Justin Taylor. "Okay, you proved me wrong, Mikey." He said softly. Then "Justin?" 

Justin gasped, turning his eyes to Brian. He smiled weakly despite the misery washing over him. "I'm having a bad day." He admitted. 

"I can see that." Brian snickered. 

"So are you?" 

Brian nodded. "I think we've got plenty of comparisons to go over tonight." 

Justin smiled. *He's planning on keeping me over tonight.* "Where is this place?" 

"Legend Avenue. Couple blocks from my house." Brian raised an eyebrow. "How did you manage-?" 

"Don't ask. I have no idea, so don't ask." 

Brian reached down and pulled the younger man to his feet. "Say we go home and take a hot shower?" 

"Anything to get out of this rain." Justin followed Brian. "Where's your Jeep?" 

"About a block that way." Brian pointed in the opposite direction of where they headed. "Smashed on a fire hydrant. And all I was trying to do was get home." 

"What time is it?" Justin asked and couldn't stifle a yawn. 

Brian checked his watch. "Almost 11:20." 

"No way." Justin groaned. "It's not noon -yet-!?" 

"I wish. Come on." 

"Is it the thirteenth?" 

"Hmm?" 

"Friday the thirteenth. It has to be." 

"The twelfth." 

Justin sighed wearily. "I guess there's no explaining it." 

They walked together, Justin leaning against Brian, the older man's arm draped around his young ward's shoulders. Climbing into the elevator, Justin smiled softly. He would be safe soon. They reached Brian's floor and stared straight towards his loft, where the door was wide open and the place gutted from wall to wall. It hadn't looked like that when he'd left. 

Brian choked on his breath. Justin turned his face up to him and couldn't hide his smile. "I think that someone forgot to set the alarm." 

Brian was beside himself. He laughed to keep from screaming, looking at his feet where the briefcase still stood, he sighed heavily. "At least they didn't steal everything." 

"Oh? Like what?" 

"Briefcase." He kicked it over, too tired to do anything more but look around. 

"And the bed." Justin smiled wider, only half-serious about doing anything that required strenuous movement. 

"Maybe this is how we were supposed to spend our day anyway." Brian thought aloud, debating the reasons for keeping Justin from moving back in with him. The good times with the boy were too energetic for him to remember the bad ones. Justin took so much trash, yet always found a way to get him back. He didn't really mind having him around as much as he pretended. 

"Tortured in the rain with concussions and street chemists?" 

Brian smiled, there was something Justin brought out in him that he could no longer deny. "No." He pulled Justin close. "Together."


End file.
